A Single Tree

My directions were on paper and nearly impossible to follow: Turn left when you find the first narrow road through the timber.  Once you drop down a steep hill and find a large boulder on the left, turn off onto the next right.  The road will soon turn into two narrow tracks.

Shadows deepened as I descended into a narrow mountain valley.  Pine and fir trees grew close together, with bough touching bough.  Branches wiped against the truck’s windshield as I slipped through the most ancient whorls.  Lesser birds hopped along the understory, flicking through occasional columns of full light, never taking to flight.

Look for a fir tree much bigger than all others.  You’ll find a grassy opening in the trees there.  It’s not a road, but turn in.  Follow spaces between trees.

I flashed through a lighted opening in the trees where a swarm of insects swirled upwards into the air.  I wheeled the truck though wide spaces as I found them.  Finally, I came to a large open swale where stood a single mountain ash tree—elegant and full and brighter than all other trees.  Yellow glacier lilies had gathered into a cluster in the shade of the tree.

I stepped from my truck to behold this, understanding for the first time…it is possible for a single tree to be the destination in an endless forest.

--Mitchell Hegman